This invention relates to a fixing device formed of a plastic material and designed to fulfil a variety of useful purposes such as of joining a plurality of panels in the face-to-face contact, fastening a bundle of electric wires to a panel and hanging articles from a panel, for example.
Generally, fixing devices of a plastic material for joining panels in face-to-face contact or for hanging articles from a panel are so constructed that leg members thereof are forced through holes bored in panels and the leg members thus passed through the panels have their leading ends split open or enlarged in diameter on the opposite side of the panels to prevent the leg members from slipping out of the bored holes or the leg members are themselves provided with engaging claws which are brought into hooking engagement with the edges of bored holes and are consequently immobilized onto the panels, with the result that the leg members thus immobilized onto the panels serve the purpose of joining the plurality of panels in the face-to-face contact or permitting articles to be hung from panels. In the case of these conventional fixing devices, their leg members usually have an extremely close relationship with the thickness of panels or the diameter of bored holes. Thus, from the standpoint of fabrication, it is essential that the fixing devices should be produced with sufficiently high dimensional accuracy. Generally, therefore, these conventional fixing devices have a common disadvantage of being so limited in their range of applications as to be of no practical utility.
An object of the present invention, therefore, is to provide a fixing device of a plastic material which is not seriously restricted by the thickness of panel or the diameter of the bored hole but is given some flexibility in that respect and consequently added practical utility and which is usable not merely for uniting a plurality of panels in the face-to-face contact but equally for fastening articles to a panel or hanging articles from a panel.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a fixing device which can easily be integrally molded by the injection molding of a plastic material.